This thesis reports the study of physical chemical properties of polymeric nanoparticles and their impact on the interaction with living cells. In particular we endeavoured to study the effect of the adhesive and mechanical properties of the vector on its capacity of penetration of the cellular membrane. With this intention, we firstly used nanoparticules of polylactic acid (PLA) functionalized on their surfaces with a ligand of the selectines E and P receptor. The grafting of the ligand on the particle’s surface was carried out thanks to a new experimental method guaranteeing the presence of the active molecule on the surface of the particle during its whole life cycle. This method consists in mixing a polymer functionalized with the ligand with another polymer not functionalized. The presence of the ligand on the surface of the nanoparticules formed starting from this mixture of polymers was confirmed by ToF SIMS analysis. We could show that the particles having the ligand grafted on their surface exhibit a higher adhesive capacity than their non-functionalized counterpart on endothelial cells HUVEC activated by various drugs. Nanoparticles adhesion on cells membrane was modulated by the level of expression of the receptors selectine E and P and also by the quantity of free ligand. These results show clearly that the functionalized particles possess all the characteristics of a pharmaceutical vector capable of targeting a particular receptor on a cell surface.
The interaction between nanoparticules and cellular membrane can also be controlled by the mechanical properties of the cell as well as of the nanoparticule. To demonstrate it we have measured the elasticity of macrophagic cells deposited on various substrates using the SFA. We have thus showed that it was possible to control the cell mechanical properties at will by controlling the interaction between the cell and the substrate on which it rests. An increase of the cell elasticity is accompanied by an increase of the internalization of non-functionalized PLA nanoparticules. This suggests a major role of cytocortical mechanical properties in the capture of hard PLA particles.
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Lastly, we studied the effect of the mechanical properties of the nanoparticules on their cellular penetration capacity. With this intention, we synthesized hydrogel particles whose elasticity was controlled by the degree of crosslinking agent included in their formulation. The control of the mechanical properties of the nanoparticules was confirmed by the measurement of the Young modulus of the particles by AFM. The interaction of these particles with macrophagess showed that the mechanical properties of the particles affect various aspects related to the internalization of the nanoparticles. The internalization kinetics, the quantity of internalized particles and the mechanism of internalization depend all on the Young modulus of the nanoparticules. No differences in the intracellular pathway could be observed in spite of the fact that various pathways of internalization were observed for these nanoparticules. This last result can be explained by the fact that the nanoparticules are internalized by several mechanisms of simultaneously which facilitates their accumulation in intracellular digestive organelles. A simple model explaining these results is proposed and discussed.